Chocolate Sorbet with a Kick

Oh, summer and ice-cream...

What you need: 

• 200 g chocolate with a high cocoa content (I use one with orange peel and one with chili)

•  100 g powdered sugar
• 400 ml water
• 1 tblspoon unsweetened cocoa powder
• 1 dash of kirsch, williams (pear schnapps), brandy or rum
• a hint of very finely ground chili for a bit of an extra kick

What you do:

1. Melt the broken up chocolate slowly by heating it up in 350 ml of water over a small flame.
2. Add the powdered sugar, stirring constantly.
3. Add the cocoa for an extra strong cocoa flavour.
4. Stir until the mixture is even and then turn up the heat to a gentle simmer, stirring constantly.
5. After about 10 minutes, the mixture will now be quite syrupy, add another 50 ml of water, still maintaining the heat.
6. If you want to use it, add the brandy or the schnapps at this stage too. If you want the flavour but not the alcohol, keep up the heat for another couple of minutes, if not, turn it down now and leave the syrup to cool. (in cold water if you're in a hurry)
7. Put the cold syrup in the fridge or even in the freezer to pre-cool. After about 90 minutes it should be cold enough that it begins to get viscuous.
8. Pour it into an icecream maker and let it churn until you have a slightly soft ice-creamy mixture. 
9. Put it in the a container and freeze. (If you haven't got an ice-cream maker, you need to whisk the mixture several times in about 2 hour intervals to keep the sorbet smooth and to break up ice crystals, which would form otherwise.)

This will be a richly flavoured chocolaty ice-cream, sorry a sorbet, as there is no dairy product (milk or cream) and no eggs in it. 
The alcohol is optional and will prevent the sorbet from getting too rock hard. In any case, it is a good idea to take it out the freezer about 15 minutes before serving to make it more "malleable".
My wife Caroline makes a superb fruit salad with all kinds of seasonal fruit, greengages, peaches, apples, blue- and other berries from our garden, etc. which goes very well with this sorbet, to put it mildly.

Picture taken by our friend and welcome guest Heiri Guanter!